Friday, March 05, 2010

"Et tu, Anita?"

"Two books chronicling Eliot Spitzer's meltdown are about to come out. One is entitled, Journal of the Plague Year, by Lloyd Constantine, a former senior adviser and close confidant of Spitzer's, revolves around a three-day period after Spitzer was linked to the prostitution ring before he resigned, during which Constantine camped out at Spitzer's Manhattan apartment. Spitzer was distraught and leaned heavily on his friend, confiding matters about his relationship with his wife. Now neither Spitzer nor Silda is speaking to Constantine."

Just wanted everybody to know that I had a banner year last year. My W2 totalled 170+. Feels great to be employable and to be living comfortably. Oh and that number does not include the two trusts paying me monthly.

Also, I am still coding on the same project. The rate is still 50 + OT, but hours have been capped to 60. Oh well. Atleast we get full weekends. I need time to spruce up my Spring Jean an Summer collection.

Also. '09 tail tally was off the charts. In addition to second year associate, I was able to nab four other randoms at about a 126 lb average. Definitely all had taught asses, and a variety of cans sizes, but the face average hovered in the 7-8 range.

All in all a good year. Good dough, tail and jeans. What more can a professional ask for.

Wow, Better Coder you are really living the high life. I am so impressed and awed by your success as a coder. And buying all those jeans. Wow, you really must have a zero-personality and motivation to fit in with doc review for so long and be so successful at it.

Is is hard to get into an LLM program at the Univ. of Pennslyvannia. I am working with a chick who did a LLB from some crappy foreign country and now got an LLM from Penn and acts like she went to Harvard. Is it really that hard to get an LLM from Penn?

Anon at 9:58, you say "all men are dogs". What about the "skanks" these guys were with who knew these guys were married? Why focus only on men who cheat on women? Why are you even bringing it up?

I have my private reservations about certain types of people and humanity in general, but I avoid proselytizing. Leave your infantile "battle of the sexes" agenda at the door. Its neither relevant nor productive on this blog, or anywhere for that matter.

Anyway, the new Jobs bill congress just passed allows for a payroll tax holiday for employers who hire people who have been unemployed for 60 days or more. Are we going to see temp agencies specifically pick out people who have been unemployed just to get the 8% tax break? That might be good news for people who have been waiting around for a while.

Glad to see 'Bettercoder' back in the cesspool with the rest of us. His schtick is great. It may be schtick but it is the personification of the dickatude that is most of those in law. Love it.

Other random thoughts: This board is called Temporary Attorney: The Sweatshop Edition.....hmmm..this leads me to ask...Is there another edition of 'Temporary Attorney'...perhaps the 'Utopia' editon? Somehow I think not. Its funny, but how could anyone believe the Hof's promises regarding any $100K big firm job?

Lemmings, know this: The folks who run lawland consider most of you to be "Mud People". You are useless to them. They sneer at you at every turn. They shun you and shut you out of lawland profitablity.

p.s. we don't just do this to the temps. Associates too. We pretend to care and listen just to keep frustration in check - let them feel like someone is listening - and for most idiots that is enough. We do what we want.

All I know is that I wish that Spitzer was still in Albany post-Lehman Bros/AIG. He scared the shit out of the likes of Henry Paulson et. al., and he wasn't the ongoing unfunny joke that is David Paterson -- so as far as I'm concerned, he could fuck all the high-priced hookers he wants as long as he was willing to go after the worst pieces of shit on Wall Street.

I invested $200k in my degree from a top school. I haven't even gotten a Mickey D's job for this. This is after 3 years of trying, day in and day out.

The situation gets more dire every day.

Did I make a mistake going to Hoftsra Law? Well you could say it have me the pedigree, the network, and the credentials. But it hasn't open many doors for me yet.

I will take ANY job.I will take ANY rate. $18 Robert Half, sign me up!You can play with my body and feel me up.A lot of big law firm partners and ABA execs did this to get ahead. They just did it secretly.

Baxter is an example of the WASP dominated big law firms nationwide and how they just get ahead based on their last name and country club connections.Meanwhile us lowly minorities are begging for temp work in Upstairs, Downstairs style.Thrown in with the Nigerians and Indian bobbleheads.

Spitzer is absolutely no saint in his personal life, but that isn't the real point. Do you think he is the only guy in Manhattan "inbibing" so to speak...heh, get a life. The real issue is whether what he did as AG and as Governor was worth respecting and if any of is planned goals or efforts did/would have benefitted the State of New York and the City of New York, rather than just himself and his long-term political ambitions. It is one thing to have a vision based on ideology/philosophy, it is another thing to utilize it as a core the "real" benefit of NYS resident and their daily economic and personal lives. I tend to think that Eliot didn't spend enough time working on construction lines for his Father's firm,during his summers, but rather spent them at expensive summer camps and on international travels during undergrad and law school. Regardless of his populist aura, he basically has the vision of someone who merely as "tracked" and lined up the credentials, one notch at a time, just as he has with women, other than his wife. It is a competitive thing, probably rooted in his upbringing....he'll never shed it, too instrinsic to his being, as evidenced in his recent attempt, again, at political comeback and the bookies stating he'll try...I do not think at this time in history he is good for New York or New York City in light of economic needs....he'll just reinforce the obvious, cater to unions, and dry New York State and New York City further down and lower in an already spiralling fiscal and ecomomic hell......he doesn't understand people, only philosophy and only in an academic sense..no real common sense, and a lack of core solid reliable values, personally and in business. NO thanks, hope he just continues writing and remaining an observer...he would be better off as Editor in Chief of the NYTs.

Former House Majority Leader Tom Delay called Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) "brave" on Sunday for launching a one-man filibuster of unemployment benefits, arguing that they dissuaded people from going out and finding work.

Appearing on CNN's "State of the Union," the Texas Republican said that Bunning's fiscal responsibility was commendable, even if his shenanigans (refusing to allow unemployment benefits to be considered by unanimous consent) nearly brought the Senate to a halt.

"Nothing would have happened if the Democrats had just paid for [the benefits]," Delay said. "People would have gotten their unemployment compensation. I think Bunning was brave in standing up there and taking it on by himself."

Asked whether it was bad strategy to make a budget stand on a $10 billion extension of unemployment (as opposed to, say, the Bush's $720 billion prescription drug package), Delay insisted that if the PR had been done right, Bunning would have been applauded. Helping the unemployed with federal assistance, he said, was unsound policy.

"You know," Delay said, "there is an argument to be made that these extensions, the unemployment benefits keeps people from going and finding jobs. In fact there are some studies that have been done that show people stay on unemployment compensation and they don't look for a job until two or three weeks before they know the benefits are going to run out.

Host Candy Crowley: Congressman, that's a hard sell, isn't it?

Delay: it's the truth.

Crowley: People are unemployed because they want to be?

Delay: well, it is the truth. and people in the real world know it. And they have friends and they know it. Sure, we ought to be helping people that are unemployed find a job, but we also have budget considerations that are incredibly important, especially now that Obama is spending monies that we don't have.

The real core issue presently in UE is that the sheer numbers if those who were laid off after @ August, 2009 and/who are presently UE after 15-19 weeks and unable still to find any work, be it temporary contract work at best. They aren't eligible for the "extensions" of recent or anything under the recently called "jobs bills" or those planned this week to hit The Hill for consideration. It was reported that those who remain UE after 15 weeked has almost tripled beyond those UE still after 15 weeks at this same time in 2008 and 2009. Adds to this the high percentage of UE in general who are in their late 40s to early 60's, for those ewho never intended an early retirement. Those remaining are NOT moving over for the 20's and 30's, and those remaining are holding tightly, hoping their friends similarly situated get axed before they get axed....this is called stagnation....Sop, if you are in your late 40s and early to mid 50's, do you assume you will never return to work period, and thus as the government hopes, you take social security benefits at 62 or earlier, locking into a far less amount of SSA benefits for the remainder of your life....some interesting stuff coming down here...

I think 7:27 can only repeat what he/she is "told" to say by those PCers to whom he/she adheres naively...he/she will be forced to "wake-up" merely by what life forces on them, like it or not...it is called reality, not hyperbole... the latter seemingly all this current WH, Rahm, Pelosi, Axelrod, and American media are capable of spewing......it is also a form of intolerance (to be unable to consider or listen to the point made by those who don't agree with you)..kind of similar to a form of intellectual "x" (you fill in the blanks).

Why is anyone still interviewing disgraces like DeLay and Spitzer? Both were forced to resign from office in disgrace, DeLay as Speaker of the House, Spitzer as NY Governor, yet they still get interviewed and asked for their opinions as if they're still relevant.

Who gives a damn what they think?

DeLay is especially out of touch with reality if he thinks people are living it up in NYC on $405 (taxable) per week.

Spitzer's hooker addiction would have been overlooked and he'd still be governor if he didn't piss off the wrong people when he was AG.

Agree, Spitzer was an idiot not only as a lawyer in his judgment (AIG's Greenberg, Grasso, and Langone, and a fund in Wisconsin), but no one pays any attention to the fact that he was one of the first person's looking at Bear Sterns, at a time prior to his run for NYS Gov,and timed it that he "doppred" reviewing the facts and taking it to a higher level within months prior to his announcing he would run for Gov...he needed Sandy Weil's money, and all those suckers who worked for Bear Sterns at the time...and thus he rocked no boats then..but calculated risk to take on Greenberg, Grasso, and Langone....he must have pretty lammo henchpeople and staff people (attorneys generally from legal aid or like) at AG's, who signed their contact letters usually with some theme and variation of "power to the people"....r-i-g-h-t (idiots)....all for headlines....Spitzer desreved to be taken out or to the wood shed for a spanking by "men".

Millions of Americans have been forced to rely on unemployment payments for extended periods as the nation struggles through its longest period of high joblessness in a generation, and critics are taking aim, saying that the Depression-era program created as a temporary bridge for laid-off workers is turning into an expensive entitlement.

About 11.4 million out-of-work people now collect unemployment compensation, at a cost of $10 billion a month. Half of them have been receiving payments for more than six months, the usual insurance limit. But under multiple extensions enacted by the federal government in response to the downturn, workers can collect the payments for as long as 99 weeks in states with the highest unemployment rates -- the longest period since the program's inception.

The unemployed say extensions help to tide them over in unusually difficult times when jobs are hard to come by. Although unemployment held steady at 9.7 percent in February, millions of jobs have been lost in the downturn, particularly in the hardest-hit sectors including real estate, construction, manufacturing and financial services. Those jobs are unlikely to return even when the economy recovers, many experts say.

But complaints that extending unemployment payments discourages job-seeking have begun to bubble into the political debate. Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) recently single-handedly held up the latest extension, a bill to keep unemployment benefits in place for 30 more days, saying Congress should find other cuts to cover its $10 billion price tag.

Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) did not join Bunning's effort, but he defended his colleague's point of view. Kyl told the Senate he questioned why anyone would see unemployment benefits as helpful to the economy, or to the job market.

"If anything, continuing to pay people unemployment compensation is a disincentive for them to seek new work," Kyl said. "I am sure most of them would like work and probably have tried to seek it, but you can't argue it is a job enhancer."

Although the availability of long-term unemployment benefits "could dampen people's efforts to look for work," the Congressional Budget Office said in a February report, that concern "is less of a factor when employment opportunities are expected to be limited for some time."

The report went on to say that people receiving unemployment benefits tend to plow the money right back into the economy, making them "both timely and cost-effective in spurring economic activity and employment."

Today, the unemployed confront a changing workplace. The Obama administration has tried to address that by investing heavily in education, clean energy and scientific research, which officials say will create the jobs of the future. But that takes time, and jobs are being lost faster than new kinds can be created. That places unprecedented pressure on a program created to provide short-term relief while people waited for jobs to return.

"It is appropriate and natural for Congress to extend the time limit of unemployment insurance with the job market as bad as it is," said James Sherk, a labor economist at the Heritage Foundation. "But by quadrupling it, it is no longer an unemployment insurance program but a welfare program."

Phillip L. Swagel, a former Treasury Department official who is now a business professor at Georgetown University, said that some people might take longer to find a new job as a result of unemployment insurance extensions, but that right now it's a needed benefit.

"The reality is that it's hard to find a job even for people who really want one," he said.

But as the job market improves, Swagel said, unemployment insurance extensions must be pared back quickly, as they have been in previous downturns. "It's important to let the extensions lapse as the job market recovers -- to avoid having disincentives to work once the job market is better," Swagel said.

Jeffrey Carlson of Grand Rapids, Mich., a former insurance salesman and father of six, says he is motivated to find work, despite the $1,650 a month he collects in unemployment benefits. That money does not go far given his rent, child support, utilities and credit card bills. Carlson, 44, said he has applied for numerous jobs with no luck and has spent $40,000 in savings.

Carlson, who made $50,000 a year before he was laid off, said watching Bunning and other senators debate whether to extend unemployment benefits was painful and infuriating.

"I paid into the system for 25 years and now I need it," he said. "People are being put through the emotional heartache and anxiety of not knowing if it's going to keep coming. There are too many people who need it and are depending on it."

The entire point is that there are few jobs being added to the market. Regardless of the argument that UE is not a wise idea (that is by Judd Gregg Libera Republicans), the fact is that no new jobs are being added to the system. I belive what is going down has more to do with policy and social engineering, and that they are perfectly happy taking a large segment of the population now from the work force,particularly those in late 40's, 50s, and 60s ( even if they don't want to retire)hoping they will take early SSA or disability benefits. It is clear social engineering. The trick is to not get caught in the game, or if you are, to figure out a way to live off the land and find back issues from late 1960s and 1970s of Mother Jones (the orignal issues that showed on how to live off the land and survive).

I will wear kinky clothes and ride the partner like a horse....just hire me, temp anything!This is how others get ahead. They say it is because of the law degree but how do you think these ABA women got their job?I will go to India and be a sex slave, too.(P.S. I'm 46.)

re 12:06AM remark.....pretty lame.That said, when desparate, like so many of us for that paycheck(s), I suppose it is an option. But I'll wager the present competition is pretty fierce if others aqlso think that is the only option. Good luck, more power to you.

According to the March 10th alert from The Economic Policy Institute,"..by the end of March, 2010, 200K workers each week will lose UE benefits without additional extensions beyond the extensions of the past and the most recent extension, earlier this month (March)". On average, it takes 20 weeks to land a new job (from when one lost their job), such that almost guaranteed is fact that all workers will exhaust their UE benefits UNLESS of course future job creation and high school academic and vocational/tech curriculums (beyond/in addition to the core classics) are devoted to and focused upon innovative, forward thinking jobs that matter, not just government jobs that are immaterial to the long-term e.g. competition on a global level. Digging this country further into mind blowing debt(no matter the path that got us to this point) is at no different than insanity e.g. continuing to do the same thing, repeatedly, when it is guaranteed to cause injury. It looks like the WH and those on the The Hill suffer from loathing this country at times, as some form of "payback" or I told you so as to laissez- faire, free market capitalism. Other alternative policy choices and decisions, also put forward, are dismissed without debate, regardless of the theatre presented to the public. Lack of real substantive talent and street smarts, or is it lack spine and guts? Or are they too soft? "But for" Judd Gregg, and the likes, there would be no voice of sanity out there, nor any attempted debate.

It's been a while since I used Concordance. Is there anywhere online I can do a refresher? I have a possible job coming up using it and need to refresh ASAP [otherwise I will be evicted!!!] Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks.